Steve Magness marathon

Precious Roy wrote:

I think Magness should run a marathon.

This. What the hell is someone who's never run a marathon or even really coached a large number of marathoner doing writing a book about it?!! Better yet, why would anyone buy this?

S. Canaday wrote:

Some could pull it off, for sure.

It depends on marathon pace and ability to recover/adapt...as well as the the sequence and absorption of other workouts.

A runner going for a sub 3, running 6:50 pace for that workout...easy, no problem.

(But most people in that time range don't run 130mpw either).

A runner going for a sub 2:15, running 5:08 pace for 12 miles (with a broken fast recovery)...pretty hard session. It's a good workout (kinda Canova style), I think it would be better to do 3-4 or even 5 weeks out though.

Don't mean to knock his plan...I've been messing up my own marathon training as well and haven't even gotten a Trials qualifier!...so there's that

Maybe you should talk to Benji Durden some more.

Again, I don't mean to knock Steve. I respect his work.

To be fair, the book isn't a "marathon training book."

It's a distance running training book...so there are applications for the 800m, the mile, 3km, 5km 10km, half marathon etc.

The marathon part is really a small bit.

It is mainly about looking at the exercise science angle of training and has solid citations and applications.

Here's some semi-agreement and semi-disagreement from my own experiences decades ago. Virtually all of my runs were at or a shade faster than marathon pace once I was warmed up and moving and a typical day for me had a main run of 10-15 miles. My long runs were usually 17-20.

In the old days when we didn't have all this information that we have now we had to work it out on our own. I reasoned out that running a full marathon meant I'd need to run slower than I normally did. I got my marathon to a bit under 6:00 pace that way and nearly always trained at least that fast and often a bit faster. That would have been true for my whole career but at different speeds. e.g., when I was running 3:05 I pretty much did roll out the door at 7:00 pace each day, when I was running 3:20s I pretty much rolled out the door at 7:30 or so each day. I had a friend who ran in the low to mid 2:20s and trained similarly, I think most of what he did was a hair either way of 5:30. Obviously someone will say I'd have raced faster if I'd run easier much of the time and maybe that's true but later in my career I experimented with doing that and got slower. Maybe that would have happened anyway at that stage.

I agree with you that at some point most people with really fast marathon times can't run at their marathon pace nearly all the time though I can think of two exceptions, both Australians. One was Ron Clarke who was running 5:00 pace or better once he got going pretty much daily. With a best marathon of 2:20, he was running much faster than marathon pace mostly all the time. The other was John Farrington who by all accounts trained on short and very fast runs, typically 6 miles at lunch in a half hour or so and another similar run after work with maybe some quarter mile reps thrown in. He ran 2:12.

I suppose my point here is that I think a session of 4 x 3 miles at marathon pace a couple of weeks before your race should be pretty manageable. I get the reluctance but I think we've gotten very conservative and risk adverse in western marathon training now and are getting results commensurate with cautious training.

The other point of semi-agreement has to do with recovering from marathons. I found that the faster my marathons became the easier they felt and the quicker I recovered. But I always ran loads of miles. even when I was trying to break 3 hours I was over 100 miles a week most of the time so I suspect I could recover pretty quickly but even with all the miles, as my times got faster so did my recoveries. That seems logical to me because as I got faster I was spending less time running at full effort in marathons and other races as well.

S. Canaday wrote:

A more advanced, more fit marathoner is competing closer to velocity at Lactate Threshold and at a higher % of max HR. ...experience, talent and high mileage pull that out. Impact force and muscle fiber demands are much higher as well.

You don't scale a plan for a 2:05 guy to fit the goals of a 3:05 guy! Relative training concepts are the same, but application is different.

I coach runners who could roll out the door pretty much at marathon pace (3+ HR runners) most days of the week. Would a sub 2:20 roll out the door at MP pace as easily?

I respectfully suggest you buy a clue.

S. Canaday wrote:

I outlined the difference in faster marathoner runners being able to compete at a higher fraction of Lactate Threshold velocity....therefore the ability to sustain a lot of muscular damage from impact force.

12-miles worth of work at MP is not exactly the same stimulus for 3:05 guys as it is for 2:05 guys (or 2:20 guys for that matter).

Sage, it's the ability of faster runners to use eccentric muscle contractions for longer that gives them better speed endurance. For this reason they don't get more muscle damage at fast paces than slower runners. This ability allows greater muscle force without greater muscle damage.

Anyone that spends any serious time with Sage will realize that he is a pseudo-intellect. He is a man of many theories. HE IS WRONG.

Vanna White wrote:

S. Canaday wrote:

A more advanced, more fit marathoner is competing closer to velocity at Lactate Threshold and at a higher % of max HR. ...experience, talent and high mileage pull that out. Impact force and muscle fiber demands are much higher as well.

You don't scale a plan for a 2:05 guy to fit the goals of a 3:05 guy! Relative training concepts are the same, but application is different.

I coach runners who could roll out the door pretty much at marathon pace (3+ HR runners) most days of the week. Would a sub 2:20 roll out the door at MP pace as easily?

I respectfully suggest you buy a clue.

You are an idiot. A slow runner could easily run faster than MP every day.

Those folks that think that Sage has a clue, remind me of the followers of Donald Trump. No real science, just drivel that people want to hear.

Are you serious? I am pretty sure the book is what he used to have published work for his education. He obviously knows what hes talking about and I seriously doubt he is that worried about his income. I am going to give it a try and see what sort of results I get. I might tweak it a little because I think Sage has a point about the final workout but it really will depend on how I am feeling at that point. If everything is going great I think you have to totally buy into the system and see what happens. I am young. I can always run more marathons. Also I have some skepticism about the beginning workouts just being short sprints but I am going to stick with it and see where that takes me. Still looking to see if anyone has any personal experience using his coaching or methods in the marathon.

Jon Orange wrote:

S. Canaday wrote:

I outlined the difference in faster marathoner runners being able to compete at a higher fraction of Lactate Threshold velocity....therefore the ability to sustain a lot of muscular damage from impact force.

12-miles worth of work at MP is not exactly the same stimulus for 3:05 guys as it is for 2:05 guys (or 2:20 guys for that matter).

Sage, it's the ability of faster runners to use eccentric muscle contractions for longer that gives them better speed endurance. For this reason they don't get more muscle damage at fast paces than slower runners. This ability allows greater muscle force without greater muscle damage.

New York Times - Jan. 15 - Crouse

"REDDING, Calif. — Sprinting seven miles down a 9,000-foot mountain and then running back up to do it again may not appeal to even the most self-punishing of athletes, but Ryan Hall believes it is the kind of “experimental workout” that transformed him into the fastest American distance runner in history"

* disclaimer - you may get injured, don't try this noob

S. Canaday wrote:

A more advanced, more fit marathoner is competing closer to velocity at Lactate Threshold and at a higher % of max HR. ...experience, talent and high mileage pull that out. Impact force and muscle fiber demands are much higher as well.

You don't scale a plan for a 2:05 guy to fit the goals of a 3:05 guy! Relative training concepts are the same, but application is different.

I coach runners who could roll out the door pretty much at marathon pace (3+ HR runners) most days of the week. Would a sub 2:20 roll out the door at MP pace as easily?

I respectfully suggest you buy a clue.[/quote]

You are an idiot. A slow runner could easily run faster than MP every day.[/quote]

I am pretty close to the runner being described (PR 2:56, easy runs done at ~7:15). I know for a fact that the faster runners can get closer to and hold their max HR longer than me. That means when they do a hard workout they will take longer to recover than I do because I am not redlining my body like they do.

Personal training is trial and error. And then later looking at Magness and other people's stuff to validate what happened.

Ryan Hall said that he would run MP runs 3 times in a week. But he didn't say when and where, or how often in cycle.

And he ran 2:04 on a downhill course with the wind at his back.

So maybe the guys that can't run sub 2:10 just can't train hard enough without breaking down. Vail and Wykes in the U.S and Canada.

I personally don't see much wrong with the workout 2 weeks out. Plenty of time to recover. Some might depend on the mileage at that point.

If it is too difficult, maybe start marathon pace plus 10-15s per mile and progress from there.

My question for those not liking the workout - how far away from the goal race is your last MP session? And what type of training volume would you find appropriate in the last 3-4 weeks for key sessions?

I just can't fathom walking into a race 28 days after my hardest specific workout. I will say, though - if you're going to do it...A marathon is the race distance to do it at since it is the most aerobic of the major race distances.

As for Magness - the book is good, but he needs to consider how his statements on his blog, twitter account, forums, etc play out to experienced coaches. It affects recruiting.

I also am close to the runner Sage was talking about: ran 2:55 this fall.

Definitely could not run 6:43 every day, but I did work up to 80mpw for several weeks. I agree that the faster you are, the harder it is to hold MP in training, but I think the volume of running you are doing (especially in relation to what you have done before) matters. That mileage was new to me so many of my runs were very slow. The day after a 10mile MP run my legs were pretty beat up, although I did end up running ~10sec faster than MP sometimes so maybe that was why.

I would say that I could probably have run ~7min pace for all my runs if I was not doing harder workouts and running lower mileage.

Again, I'd say for runners over about 2:40-2:45 that would be a fine workout and something they could recover from. The amount of quality volume is pretty high 14 days out though. For a sub 2:40 guy it's a harder workout to recover from (and since the plan goes up to 130 mpw I'm assuming it's targeting probably more sub 2:30 types who are very very serious and have a lot of time to train).Basically with the 800m recovery between each 3-miles at MP...you are running a full half marathon fairly close to all-out MP. Would you jump in a half marathon race 2 weeks before a full (and run it at MP)?Again, I think it's a great workout, but I question why it's only 14 days out. I think some would struggle to recover in such a short time frame (given fatigue building up from other workouts....Long Runs etc. maybe in the last 21 days before the marathon).If we look at endurance adaptations for a workout like this they take a bit longer to kick in compared to something like a more traditional "Vo2max/Economy" type of workout like 8 x 1000m at 5km-8km pace or 4-5 x 1600m at 8km-10km pace. That's why I'd have the shorter intervals be used 2 weeks out....you can still get a boost in Running Economy and lactate clearance with a lot less quality volume faster and slightly higher intensity (above the LT even).That being said I'm also in fan of running easy days at 1:30+/mile slower than MP for most miles as well. (Maybe only 1:00/mile slower if over 3 hrs in the marathon). Again though, really depends on what time range you are in for the marathon, as well as experience level, age, age in the sport, FT/ST fiber distribution and durability.

In my experience, 3-4 hour marathoners can run MP for quite a ways without much difficulty, whereas I can't really do 12-13 miles at the back end of my long run at true MP until the very end of my training cycle.

experience counts wrote:

Precious Roy wrote:

I think Magness should run a marathon.

This. What the hell is someone who's never run a marathon or even really coached a large number of marathoner doing writing a book about it?!! Better yet, why would anyone buy this?

some of it is canova based. magness alternation workouts (MP/10K paced) are gold. check those out. there is a RW article if you don't have the book.

Those folks that think that Sage has a clue, remind me of the followers of Donald Trump. No real science, just drivel that people want to hear.[/quote]

I appreciate these guys taking time to discuss MP and training. All of them. It appears to me they are communicating their experiences and instincts. They seem to be going out of their way to be exactly truthful. Unlike your girl Hillary. My favorite lie to the American people was how she knows what its like to be in combat. As she was under sniper fire when landing at a airport. A week later on TV the host shows her the video of her landing...a complete LIE. It was Hillarious! Guess that's not drival. Kind of like Never had sex with that women. His DNA dribble was present however.